Get Saucy in Nashville, TN

March 25, 2017

Yeah, yeah, so I’ve been jumping around a bit. We went to Nashville, TN as our last destination on our road trip after camping in Oliver Springs,TN and falling in love with Asheville, NC. If you haven’t read the Asheville series or Mountain Lions, Sunken Rides, and Bears…Oh My!, hop to it 🙂 Anyhoo, after a night of laughter and terror at the campsite (See, I told ya! You gotta read the others!), Gina was so ready to pack up and move on to a big city with an actual hotel. We made it into Nashville after a two and a half hour drive. We were several hours too early to check into our hotel, so we found some activities to keep us occupied. (Quick reminder, we used disposable cameras on this trip!)

Grand Ole Opry

To kill some time, we went to the Grand Ole Opry. If you haven’t heard of it, the Opry is pretty much the birth place of Country Music. It’s where the genre became famous, and it is what paved the way for Nashville to become known as Music City. Though we did not take a tour, we enjoyed taking photographs with our disposable camera on the outside next to the giant guitars and gardens. It was hot as hell, so we spent some time sitting on a bench in a shaded area, talking and admiring the Opry.

Dave & Busters

The Grand Ole Opry was right across the street from a mall called the Opry Mills which included many stores and restaurants, such as Dave and Busters. On the outside of Dave and Busters, there was a large advertisement for a slushy. I pointed to it and said to Gina, “I hope there’s alcohol in that!”…There was! With a few hours still to burn before we could check into our hotel, we decided to get involved in a little day drinking. If you haven’t had a Dave & Buster’s adult “snow cone”, you are so missing out! Dave and Busters in general is always a great place to hang out. It’s pretty much an adult Chuck E. Cheese! The wait staff…well, bartender haha…was very friendly and accepting of our shenanigans. We had some appetizers and then went to check into our hotel.

Downtown

Rippy’s Bar and Grill

When we checked into our hotel, we were surprised to learn that it was also the weekend for the CMA Music festival. Unfortunately, we did not see anyone famous walking the strip, but the city was definitely hoppin’! We walked up and down Broadway Street. Every bar and store was open, and most of the bars had live music. We chose to have a seat at an open air corner bar and grill called Rippy’s. The drink prices were hiked up because of the event, but their pour was strong! They had a lot of interesting specialty shots, and I took the liberty of trying a few. While at the bar, a couple sat next to us. Their names were Lee and Tim, and we really hit it off with them. By the end of our time at Rippy’s, we were buying each other drinks and shots. And what a small world it is! We found out that Gina, Lee, and Tim had actually crossed paths before! Gina used to sing at a martini bar closer to home that Lee and Tim used to frequent. It was one of those “hey, I think I know you from somewhere…” moments. Lee and Tim wanted to try out a karaoke bar called the Wild Beaver, so we decided to tag along with them…because LEZbihonest. It’s the Wild Beaver lol.

Wild Beaver Saloon

Let me tell you what. Karaoke in Nashville is no joke. I mean, in Wisconsin, you grin and bear it. You go to karaoke bars to laugh with people, sing like an ass, and wait for that ONE person in the entire place that can moderately hit a note. But in Nashville, there’s either something in the water, or those that come here are all just trying to make it big! One guy, I swear, sounded exactly like Josh Turner. I don’t care how much you think you “hate” country music. His voice is amazing. Gina loves her karaoke, so she got a couple songs in too. In fact, I secretly signed her up to sing “Baby Got Back” by Sir Mix A lot. You know what that is…”I like big butts and I cannot lie…” Yep. In a country bar. Talk about hate. Gina had hate in that moment. haha But hey, everyone loved it 😉 Oh, and I also rode the mechanical bull there. That was a blast! I’ve never done that before. How legit is it for my first time to be in Nashville. If only I had a cowboy hat! One last random thought for the Wild Beaver…they had some of the best bar pizza ever. Like. Ever ever.

Play Dance Club

After spending quite some time at the Wild Beaver, we decided we wanted to check out a gay bar. I know, finally, right? This whole website is supposed to be about gay people doing gay things, and I haven’t even written about a gay bar yet. Well, keep your pants on (or don’t) because here it is. We took a walk to a gay club called Play. It was a little out of sight from the lively city streets, and it appeared that it may be in a not so great part of town. The club, however, was pretty awesome! We walked in while they were having a drag king show. That drag king show, still to this day, was the best one we had ever seen. Their music choice/DJ was great, their choreography was smooth, and they weren’t ugly. Seriously, Wisconsin. Step it up! It’s not that we don’t have some awesome drag king performers back home, but many of them are pretty goofy…Kinda like me when I did drag at 17 and 18 years old… you can see that here and here. No shame lol. Overall, Play Dance Club was an exciting place to be. They seemed to have a strong singles scene with super attractive women (femme, stud, chapstick… Whatever you fancy). The club was filled predominately with females in their 20’s and 30’s. But don’t be discouraged, boys; it was ladies night!

I think I can speak for both of us when I say that Nashville was blast. We will definitely make a return trip for a longer stay in the near future. We met some friendly people, ate great food, and had a rowdy time at the bars.

LGBT Friendly Rating Plug: When we first arrived, we were met with quite a few stares and double takes as we held hands walking down the strip. I was mostly oblivious to it, but it made Gina uncomfortable. She learned to ignore it, and we ended up having an incredible time. My advice, don’t let other peoples’ ignorance ruin your time. What ever problem anyone has with you is exactly that…THEIR PROBLEM. Fly your freak flag proudly! I’d like to return and see how LGBT friendly the locals are before I establish an actual rating. As I said, it was the CA Music Fest, so the city was flooded with tourists that night. Maybe the outsiders were the ones with the sticks up their butts!

Thank you for reading my blog posts. I appreciate it more than you can imagine! I hope you have been enjoying traveling with us! If you have any comments or suggestions, whether it be related to my blog, writing, website, or destinations, please contact me! I’d love to hear from you! Where will we go next?